Saturday, July 5, 2014

Audition Weekend

Encore! Managing Director, Mindy Barker, shares her experience and photos from last weekend's auditions and workshop. Also in the post: More acting opportunities, acting classes, auditions survey, and congratulations to the cast of The Lost Pages of Snow White!

Mindy Barker
Managing Director, Encore!

In my last post, I discussed the difficulty in casting a theatre production. Last weekend, I experienced it, yet again!

Auditions

We had an amazing turnout. We had so many submissions, that we could not offer everyone an appointment to see them audition in person on Sunday. Even then, we were busy constantly watching actors back-to-back from 6:00 until past 9:00pm, then again at callbacks on Monday. We heard Spanish and Brooklyn accents, creepy old lady voices, sneezes and yawns, and everything in between. All of you gave us a good laugh or a fright- in a good way, of course.

We notified actors who were cast on July 2, and publicly announced the cast yesterday. Click here to visit the production page and view the 37 actors who will be performing August 15-17 at Tulsa Little Theatre. Tickets go on sale July 21.

Congratulations to everyone who was cast! If you were not cast, please know that although there wasn't a part for you in this show, we have many more opportunities coming soon (see below). Please audition for us again. For everyone who auditioned, we encourage you to take our survey to help us improve our audition process. You'll receive a $20 tuition credit toward an Encore! class to thank you for your valuable feedback. Click here to take the survey!

Audition Workshop

The day before auditions, we held our Audition Workshop. This helped actors prep for theatre auditions and receive valuable one-on-one acting coaching. Parents also learned valuable information to support their children in their artistic and performing endeavors.

Remember my puzzle analogy from my last blog post? The students experienced the difficulty of casting from a director's point of view through our puzzle activity. They created beautiful puzzle pieces to represent themselves as actors, then had to find a way to piece them together to create a unified cast.

After an afternoon of improv games, relaxation exercises, one-on-one acting coaching, cold reading instruction, and an on-camera critique, the students officially auditioned for The Lost Pages of Snow White. The students certainly put what they learned to good use, because they were all cast in the show. Great work, and congratulations, girls!

More Acting Opportunities

We still have educational opportunities this summer. These are great opportunities to prep for film, theatre, and improv auditions that we will be holding at the end of the summer. All classes are taught by the L.A. directors who will be casting these projects- myself and my husband, Joshua! Our classes/camps have been recognized in Oklahoma Magazine's Best of the Best and TulsaKids Magazine's Family Favorites.

"Lessons with Mindy! Those lessons gave Jesamine the confidence that she needed to just take off! Thank you!" Judith Katzman, Jesamine's MomIn addition to classes with Encore!, Jesamine has performed with us in The Wizard of Oz, Peter Pan, and the upcoming Lost Pages of Snow White. She has also received awards for her acting, and performed in a dance video starring Emilio Dosal, champion of America's Best Dance Crew.